The main objective of the study is to ascertain the influence of tax revenue on economic development of Nigeria. The specific objectives are; to determine the influence of petroleum profit tax, company income tax and value added tax on economic development proxy by human development index (HDI). Annual time series data, from CBN and FIRS from 1997 to 2018 was used. The study used regression analysis. The result showed that petroleum profit tax and company income tax have significant effect on economic development while value added tax does not significantly influence economic development. The implication of the finding is that the higher the amount of tax revenue generated, the higher the level of economic development experienced by the economy. This implies that taxes that have positive effect on economic development are direct taxes, thus direct taxes exert more significant influence on economic development of Nigeria than indirect taxes. This anomaly was attributed to dysfunctional ties in tax system, loopholes in tax law and inefficient tax administration. The lower the amount of revenue generated from tax the lower the quality of development to be witnessed. Government will generate higher revenue if they strengthen the legal and regulatory framework in order to control tax evasion and tax avoidance by taxpayers, improve on the system of tax administration, .The paper therefore recommended that tax policy makers such as federal inland revenue services and other tax regulatory bodies should strengthen their regulation on tax compliance mostly on tax that are direct based to curb tax evasion and tax avoidance by tax payers, adopt strategies to improve system of tax administration, by training and re- training of tax administrators through seminars and conferences to be abreast of modern trend in tax administration in order to generate more income for development.
Keywords: Gross Domestic Product, Tax Revenue, Taxation, direct and indirect tax, economic growth
